Steve Ballmer has always been a demonstrative speaker. During a conference in Seoul, Microsoft CEO, kept talking about Windows 8 as the re-birth of Windows. According to his words, this version version have the most impact in the world... Microsoft projects that next year 400 to 500 millions copies (legal and/or illegal?) of Windows 8 will have been sold. To reach such figures, he has been adding all Windows 8 version: PC, tablets, mobile phones, etc. Today, 350 million licenses of Windows 7 has been shipped.
Of course, Balmmer is known to be over-optimistic, and he seems certain of the success of Windows 8, on Pc, but also on mobile phone as a way for Microsoft to try to catch up with iOS and Android. A serous challenge for Microsoft.
We can also say that we would be please to hear Tim Cook speaking about re-birth of Mac OS X, aka "Renaissance". IT is rather true that Snow Leopard, Lion and the forthcoming Mountain Lion are evolution of a system that was fully developed with 10.5. Teh last evolution have been adding some features, and/or gadgets to make it looking like iOS, without really improving the user experience.
